Bubbles: Hello Bubbles / 1 Little 2 Little 3 Little Bubbles
Hello song: Hands are clapping/Hey Hey How are You (with uke)
Welcome song: Willoughby Wallaby Woo (with uke)
House of Sounds/Letter of the Day
Book 1: Froggy Gets Dressed, by Jonathan London and Frank Remkiewicz. Froggy wants to play in the snow, but he’s so excited he just can’t seem to get the right clothes on! This is without a doubt my FAVORITE Froggy book. Froggy forgetting his pants, his shirt, and finally his underwear always gets a big laugh. As it turned out, it also had a lot of good words that start with the letter S–scarf, socks, shirt, sleep, and of course, snow.
Flannelboard: If you’re playing in the snow (to the tune of If you’re happy and you know it)
If you’re playing in the snow wear your mittens (clap hands)
If you’re playing in the snow wear your mittens (clap hands)
If you’re playing in the snow, this is what you need to know
If you’re playing in the snow, wear your mittens (clap hands)
(boots/stomp feet, hat/pat head, all three)
Book 2: The Snowy Day, by Ezra Jack Keats. If I had to pick a top five of my favorite picture books, this would be one of them. As many times as I’ve read it, it never gets old. Even though it’s very quiet, it’s rich with opportunities for discussion and it perfectly describes what a snow day is like for a child. This is especially valuable for kids where I live in South Georgia–many of them have never experienced snow in this way. I especially love talking about where the snowball Peter put in his pocket went.
Rhyme: Snowflake, snowflake. I had some of this polyfill in my stash, so I made some snowballs for us to use with this rhyme.
Snowflake, snowflake dance around (hold snowball up and move it around)
Snowflake, snowflake touch the ground (touch ground with snowball)
Snowflake, snowflake soft and white (touch face with snowball)
Snowflake, snowflake SNOWBALL FIGHT (throw snowball).
The first time through the kids obviously weren’t expecting me to throw a snowball at them, so we did it a second time and they got to throw their snowballs at me. It was really adorable.
Book 3: Snowmen at Night, by Caralyn Buehner and Mark Buehner. Optional–I used this with pre-k and Headstart groups but not in storytime, although I think they would have enjoyed it. The snowmen do several of the things that Peter does (snowball fight, snow angels, sledding), so I usually bring that up when I’m talking about it.
Closing song: Baby Shark (with uke)
Activity: fake snow. A couple of years ago I got some packets of instant snow on clearance at Michael’s and stowed it away. I decided today was the perfect opportunity to use it. I think I had four packets and it was an ample amount for the 6 kids I had. (Of course you could make snow with baking soda and shaving cream or hair conditioner.) I made 3 packets ahead of time in bins (see photo below) and put them in the freezer so that they would be cold. After storytime, I made a half packet in front of them so that they could see how it worked, then I got the cold ones from the freezer. I laid out a tablecloth and gave them cups and spoons to play with the snow. We had to carefully watch so that no one ate any, but it was really fun and I think they enjoyed it.
LibrErin 